A winner at last! Eddie the Eagle.
Photograph: Larry Horricks/Lionsgate

The winner: Eddie the Eagle

The week after Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice was always going to be a relatively quiet session for new releases, but Lionsgate sensed a counter-programming opportunity with its heartfelt British comedy Eddie the Eagle. Released on Easter Monday to take advantage of the school holiday, the film has delivered a seven-day debut of £2.83m. Strip out the first four days, and you get a three-day weekend number of £1.55m.

Dubbing gets a drubbing and Eddie the Eagle reviewed – the Dailies film podcast

Read more

Lionsgate is billing this as the biggest UK opening of a British film since Spectre last October, although that claim deserves qualification. If Eddie’s previews are ignored, and it’s the three-day weekend numbers that are compared, both The Lady in the Van (£2.26m, last November) and Dad’s Army (£2.08m, February) debuted bigger.

British cinema bookers have been excited about Eddie’s commercial potential since Lionsgate started screening the film in early December. Comparisons such as Billy Elliot and The Full Monty have been mentioned – setting the bar rather unrealistically high for this genial crowdpleaser.

Replicating the success of Billy Elliot (£18.39m lifetime) or even East Is East (£10.37m) is a feat that has eluded many a plucky Britcom in the intervening years, including Kinky Boots (£3.06m), Made In Dagenham (£3.86m) and Pride (£4.07m). Lionsgate rolled the dice on Eddie with a sizeable marketing push, and will be pleased with, and relieved by, the outcome so far.

The family winner: Zootropolis

Having debuted the previous weekend with £5.31m including significant previews, Zootropolis added another £7.29m over the past seven days, taking its total so far to £12.6m. Weekend box office fell by a slim 24%, and the Disney animation should continue to perform robustly this week, with some kids still off school for Easter – in fact, Zootropolis was the biggest grossing film in the UK on Monday, ahead of both Batman v Superman and the newly released The Huntsman: Winter’s War.

The Good Dinosaur, from Disney Animation’s stablemate Pixar, reached a rather poor £15.05m (the lowest ever for a Pixar feature film in the UK), and Zootropolis is clearly going to sail past that number. Takings should significantly soften after Sunday, however, with most kids back to school next Monday.

Disney has had to compete for the family audience with DreamWorks Animation’s Kung Fu Panda 3 (£11.15m so far), and to some extent with Eddie the Eagle and the 12A-rated Batman v Superman.

The big faller: Batman v Superman

Second sessions for big superhero blockbusters usually see a big drop at the box office, but the speed of decline for Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice might be giving Warners and DC Comics cause for concern. In line with results in other territories, the vigilante team-up crashed 68% here, for second-weekend takings of £4.66m and a 10-day total of £27.83m.

By comparison, Man of Steel fell 55% in its second frame, and The Dark Knight Rises 49%. Over in the Marvel camp, Avengers Assemble dropped 39% on its second weekend and the sequel Age of Ultron fell 41%.

Having credibly made the claim that Batman v Superman delivered the biggest superhero movie opening ever in the UK, Warners now sees that lead eroded. Its own The Dark Knight Rises stood at £30.55m after two weekends, for example. Both Avengers films had likewise achieved bigger tallies than Batman V Superman after two weekends, although they benefitted from previews, so comparisons are not really fair at this relatively early stage.

The arthouse challenger: Victoria

With £109,000 from 34 cinemas including £25,000 in previews, Victoria has delivered the biggest arthouse foreign-language opening in many a month. Leaving aside Bollywood titles and mainstream Chinese comedy Mermaid, you’d have to go back to May last year, when Francois Ozon’s The New Girlfriend began with £117,000 (including £35,000 in previews), and even then, Victoria is bigger over the three-day weekend period. Before that, Force Majeure began with £86,000 plus previews of £1,500 – Victoria is slightly behind if previews are ignored.

Excluding Bollywood, only three foreign language films managed £300,000 at the UK box office last year (Wild Tales, Force Majeure, Timbuktu), and to say there is a rooting interest in the success of Victoria would be an understatement.

Victoria director Sebastian Schipper was previously little known in the UK, and ditto the film’s principal cast, so distributor Curzon sold a fresh new voice delivering a genre-melding film shot in a single take, with strong critical acclaim (“Dazzling … A heart-racing, adrenaline-pumped heist thriller” – Hollywood Reporter).

Batfleck to the rescue and Victoria reviewed – the Dailies film podcast

Read more

So far, the biggest non-Bollywood foreign language hit of 2016 is Icelandic comedy Rams, which started modestly and then played steadily, reaching £269,000 so far. Marguerite has notched up a handy £179,000.

The local hit

John Carney’s Sing Street continues its strong run in Ireland and Northern Ireland, now in its third week of release, with box-office takings increasing 1% from the previous weekend. The film has already grossed £570,000 from 80 venues, and is clearly enjoying strong word of mouth. The semi-autobiographical film from the Once director follows a teenage boy growing up in Dublin in the 1980s, who starts a band with schoolmates. Sing Street reaches cinemas on the UK mainland on 20 May.

The future

Thanks to the lack of strong new releases and the big drop for Batman v Superman, takings are 45% down on the previous frame, and also 38% down on the equivalent weekend from 2015, when Fast & Furious 7 arrived at the top of the chart, kickstarting the summer blockbuster season a month early. Now bookers are pinning their hopes on The Huntsman: Winter’s War, a prequel to Snow White and the Huntsman, which arrived in cinemas on Monday. Landing on Friday is Jeff Nichols’ Midnight Special, starring Michael Shannon, Joel Edgerton, Kirsten Dunst and Adam Driver. Hardcore Henry is a genre film aimed squarely at gamers. Arthouse alternatives include Jacques Audiard’s Cannes Palme d’Or winner Dheepan.